So now quite a lot of you will surely notice that this template seems to have zero defensive means. This is almost correct and yes, this is totally on purpose. I "want" others to hit me because the very first spell I always cast is blood oath (after an initial strength potion) so the more you hit me, the better for me, even if you neutralize the oath it still keeps you very busy and that's the only thing I really need to do at that point. It is impossible to ever interrupt me since I always PvP with "Protection" spell turned on since I do not need that much faster casting. This actually is a drawback only your personal skill as a player can compensate but I am very sure quite a lot of you will be able to do this the same way I do. With evil omen and poisoning-boosted poison you do not just "sometimes" to deadly poison - you do it almost all the time and this really creates a panic.

if anyone unprepared for this template now would have hit me in between he would now be plain dead since my foe even with 120 Strength at the beginning would drop to around 100 due to the curse, myself being boosted to around 120. Any hit on me thus harms my foe way more than me, especially since I can heal 90 hitpoints within approx. 1 second (spirit speak + gr. heal potion and/or greater heal spell if it gets reeeaaally close).

This template creates an enormous damage output per second, especially against warriors. Yet thanks to mind rot and the fact that Blood Oath also reflects spell damage this template is very effective against mages as well.

The only weaknesses I noticed were poisondexxers, yet I only lost twice times to them (and once to a pure mage *coughs*). The other four deaths were during testing / getting used to the template.

Btw shame on those that disregard "Curse". It is just one of the best PvP spells in the game in my opinion, since if not treated it causes you not to simply be "wounded", it makes you lose these hitpoints "unhealable" during that fight.

So now quite a lot of you will surely notice that this template seems to have zero defensive means. This is almost correct and yes, this is totally on purpose. I "want" others to hit me because the very first spell I always cast is blood oath (after an initial strength potion) so the more you hit me, the better for me, even if you neutralize the oath it still keeps you very busy and that's the only thing I really need to do at that point. It is impossible to ever interrupt me since I always PvP with "Protection" spell turned on since I do not need that much faster casting. This actually is a drawback only your personal skill as a player can compensate but I am very sure quite a lot of you will be able to do this the same way I do. With evil omen and poisoning-boosted poison you do not just "sometimes" to deadly poison - you do it almost all the time and this really creates a panic.

if anyone unprepared for this template now would have hit me in between he would now be plain dead since my foe even with 120 Strength at the beginning would drop to around 100 due to the curse, myself being boosted to around 120. Any hit on me thus harms my foe way more than me, especially since I can heal 90 hitpoints within approx. 1 second (spirit speak + gr. heal potion and/or greater heal spell if it gets reeeaaally close).

This template creates an enormous damage output per second, especially against warriors. Yet thanks to mind rot and the fact that Blood Oath also reflects spell damage this template is very effective against mages as well.

The only weaknesses I noticed were poisondexxers, yet I only lost twice times to them (and once to a pure mage *coughs*). The other four deaths were during testing / getting used to the template.

Btw shame on those that disregard "Curse". It is just one of the best PvP spells in the game in my opinion, since if not treated it causes you not to simply be "wounded", it makes you lose these hitpoints "unhealable" during that fight.

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This post convinces me that you may in fact be one of the worst pvpers I've encountered to date.

You may think whatever you like to, I personally know I do not appreciate the "newskool" stuff, I am still oldschool in many ways I got to admit.

If you like to continue your "omg he's such a bad pvper" stuff, please do elsewhere since you yourself by doing so admit not having a) any guts b) any attitude c) any respect and thus are one of the many wannabes to me that never experienced the merry wonders of pre-AoS-PvP.

I do not need to prove myself, pal. I did this when I was playing my 2nd and 3rd year, back 2001/2002. Ever since I became calm and rest within myself. This creates true strength within yourself and this reflects yourself in every situation including PvP. To me PvP is a natural flow of events, like a well-oiled machinery. No thoughts - just actions and reactions.

How did old Ed (McManus) (you know... one of the legendary ones) state it so precisely?

"You can be a difference in a newbie's life. Do me a favor - make a PK".

I might be the worst pvper you met so far. Or I just might be good enough to play this template to its benefits. I do not care for which one you believe, I will not come to your shard and demonstrate anything, I will not blame you for doing so. You are just joining the long row of hundreds of players that never understood. It is your choice, not mine. But since you like to be so newskool to me let me add: my current kill ratio is 194 kills, 7 deaths. 3 of these deaths were after getting used to the template and being maxed out. My goal of reaching 200 kills and less than 10 deaths lays within reach and will be reached as certain as I reach my next goals as long as I invest so much effort as I did with this one. Do not try to judge me depending on number of postings or stuff like that. Chances are I am in this game for a longer time and these chances are quite high... sadly the only legend I never could beat was Lady Zaire, due to the fact that our ways parted 6 years ago and back then I of course was worse than I am today.

Btw:
Much appreciated the 2nd post of this thread. I personally am also going for 120 magery 80 poisoning (calculation reasons), yet I always create very natural templates meaning that type of template which makes you get the idea of it while tuning it for personal likes and dislikes. This is also why all of my templates are made for the 700 caps and do not use any powerscrolls. Even a poor new character without any pushing and without gold farming can do this and become successful "if" the player behind it has the skill to do so.

This is why I included "for the experienced" in the title.
This template DOES have drawbacks (major ones even) but it also has a LOT of advantages. You just need to maximize the latter while reducing the first.

Stratics Veteran

A good geared archer will get 2x AI (+ hit spell) before you manage to get blood oath casted. Once you cast it, he'll switch to a crossbow, eat an apple and finish you off with Mortal+Concussion blow.

Any good mage would rip you wide open by just keeping you constantly poisoned to prevent you from casting Gheal and using low-circle spells to chew away your HP.

My mage, for an example, has 150HP with a str pot and I would have no worries even if I started with curse-explo-FS. I'd just eat an enchanted apple when you cast blood oath and you'd already be half dead :|

Usually I do no have a problem with being poisoned since I usually suffer from level 2 poison if at all. Since the damage of this does not bother me all I do if I want to get healed is to cast a cure, drink a healpot + use spirit speak if I really need the HP or I just drink a cure and cast a heal, yet this is usually not my preferred way.

Since I am blessed and use stat pots before going into battle and first of all blood oath and/or curse my enemy it's usually giving quite a good start for the fight. Surely an archer can hit me hard but yes that's the way I want him to hit me for his own suffering. While doing so he suffers from the BO-reflected damage while I first of all lose my boosted hits plus a few extra. So at the point I am hit twice I might have around 90-100 Hp, my enemy around 90-100 as well yet he has a blood oath and a curse on him. This is a clear advantage since he can "not" heal up to his full potential (cursed) and his future attacks will be causing himself pain as well which strengthens my damage output a fair amount. Thus I am at an advantage at that point.

From then on I begin my offensive casting frenzy myself and the more he struggles and tries to kill me, the worse it gets for him since I have three ways of healing me (spirit, pots, magery) and it often astonishes me how confused many players are if you cast two explosions or an explo and a mindblast + poison quickly enough. It leads to them forgetting one of these spells in quite some cases. This is only forced by poisoning them deadly. I usually do not fail at causing deadly poison on people with low resist since I cast Evil Omen in advance. The oldest trick in UO still works best: poison doesn't really do such a huge damage but it makes people go to panic mode. Panic leads to errors, errors lead to death.

Of course I am aware of the meager defensive skills with this template but I really like playing offensive damage dealing temps, even if at the risk of being over the top of that cliff called "Balance". Most troubles I still got with necro/poisondexxers, since their damage reflection is not too high with Blood Oath (since they deal sort of an indirect damage). The more direct damage I receive the better, so basically the easiest way to beat this template is to focus on your defense until I am out of mana which happens rather fast compared to other temps. This is when I am at the point of highest risk and need to fall back. Yet my foe has to conceal his defensive manner because I would just stick to defense as well as soon as I notice him going for defense. This would lead to a draw - still better than being kicked. Yet this does not happen too often (yet far more often than being killed).

@Lynk
As I told you before when you were not listening (something I already assumed since this is typical of people I consider to be your fellow Joe Hangarounds, you see you fit perfectly into that cliche) I am not trying to prove anything to anyone and I won't get to your candymountain just for any reason. I simply do not need to. by the way we both know you did read it to the end, don't we? Aye aye... poor little neglected pal. If you got any problem with that go bark at the moon, jump around three times on one leg and shout "It's me, it's me, Mortimer is here!". This should make you feel better. Old recipe you know.
See it doesn't bother me what you think of me *shrugs*. I just know who I am and what I am capable of and what I am not capable of (the second one being far more important). I am not capable of competing with your level of expertise in the very skill of Yaddayaddda. Congratulations. Your skill in yaddayaddayadda has increased by 0.1%. It is now 119.9%.
You're going to be legen-wait for it-dary!

Stratics Veteran

First I'll review a few pointers on how blood oath and curse actually work (as if everyone didn't already know).

Now allow me to share my tactic with you so that you may see how correct Lynk was in his OP to this thread.

Thirdly, and lastly, Lynk - I acknowledge that I cannot win an argument with you and because of this I will say "I don't care what you think" in a few different ways, each meaningless in their own right.

You say you're going to run with protection since you don't 'need' the FC...I guess you don't fully understand the need for FC in today's UO.

What are you going to do about a dexer who hits you everytime because you have no defense, other than DCI, and they keep hitting you with specials, over and over...You do realize that casting g.heal does take time...especially w/out the proper amount of FC.

From then on I begin my offensive casting frenzy

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Good luck with this one with protection cast... I hope you realize, that most any good mage who realizes you have this cast, is going to mana vamp you till you're manaless, and then dump on you (in more way than one) and you'll be collecting a grey robe.

With skills only at GM, Magery/EI you're going to have a hell of a time trying to get off any high damage spells.

I am still oldschool in many ways I got to admit

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Oldschool, you'd be a pure mage or a tank mage... not a necro mage.

my current kill ratio is 194 kills, 7 deaths. 3

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How are you keeping count? And these 7 deaths... and 194 kills... killing miners and crafters doesn't count. I honest can't fathom who would die to such a weak template.

Or I just might be good enough to play this template to its benefits

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Honestly... I don't see any benefits to this template, other than being able to cast spells w/out interruption, and being easy insurance money for others.

And your title is wrong... most, if not all experienced players could tear this template down and tell you why it's such a bad idea... and isn't really that great. But anywho... go toot your own horn about your awesome experience templates.

First I'll review a few pointers on how blood oath and curse actually work (as if everyone didn't already know).

Now allow me to share my tactic with you so that you may see how correct Lynk was in his OP to this thread.

Thirdly, and lastly, Lynk - I acknowledge that I cannot win an argument with you and because of this I will say "I don't care what you think" in a few different ways, each meaningless in their own right.

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The problem is that you think someone is trying to "win" an argument.
The second poster wasn't asking for an argument. If he felt his tactics worked for him , then that's his opinion. Why he would care about what you think? He wasn't responding to your posts...

It's a shame that a few people have to continually go back and forth through the forums being police like anyone give a darn, If you have an issue state it , but this police stuff is just silly and I don't understand why a few of you feel the need to correct the forums as if you're the only person who has an opinion....

The second poster wasn't asking for an argument. If he felt his tactics worked for him , then that's his opinion. Why he would care about what you think? He wasn't responding to your posts...

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Lynk wasn't responding to the second posters response either...

It's a shame that a few people have to continually go back and forth through the forums being police like anyone give a darn, If you have an issue state it , but this police stuff is just silly and I don't understand why a few of you feel the need to correct the forums as if you're the only person who has an opinion....

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Policing...I wouldn't call it policing. I would call it trying to give sound advice so people don't think they've got a solid template... go out and get wtfpwnt, then come back here pissing and moaning because their template doesn't work.

It's proven that there are templates that work, and templates that don't. There's nothing wrong in telling someone their template/tactics aren't going to work. Especially coming from someone who has been in the PvP scene for a number of years and already knows what works and what doesn't.

Not only is it good advice, but it will save the person's time and they can focus on a template that is actually viable in PvP and not just a pipe dream.

God this is sickening

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Please leave religion out of it. God doesn't care what you think about a thread on Stratics.

Policing...I wouldn't call it policing. I would call it trying to give sound advice so people don't think they've got a solid template... go out and get wtfpwnt, then come back here pissing and moaning because their template doesn't work.

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Guess what , Pre-AOS that happened all the time. People would get smoked and this would be one of the things they would question is their template. The next thing is their play style. Then they question their equipment. I still do this. I think it's a good thing that people question what they do. A template may work better for Person A then Person B. That one thing I like about UO it's customizable based on the items, skill and play of the user. Assuming everyone is the same and plays the same is a horrible assumption.

It's proven that there are templates that work, and templates that don't. There's nothing wrong in telling someone their template/tactics aren't going to work. Especially coming from someone who has been in the PvP scene for a number of years and already knows what works and what doesn't.

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Reread Lynk's posts in this thread... That's not what he was doing. He was criticizing the OP. The OP didn't ask for lynk's opinion on how he rank on lynk's "kewlness" scale

Not only is it good advice, but it will save the person's time and they can focus on a template that is actually viable in PvP and not just a pipe dream.

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Whatever. I agree that some things don't work , but that's up to the OP to find out for himself. We should give pointers as to why things work and will not work. Not simply say people suck which is what Lynk did

I'm not going to sugar coat it. I've helped several people on this forum fix their template, both dexers and mages. Believe it or not some people actually do listen to my feedback and find it entertaining at the same time- regardless of how direct and insulting it may be.

If you come here posting a bunch of bull****, like you and the OP in this thread, I'm going to call you on it so others don't run around with incorrect knowledge.

If you ask a serious question (that hasn't been asked 50 times) that can help the stratics community I will assist without satire.

Now quit whining because you feel hurt that everyone that knows what they are talking about disagrees with you.

You are like Tyra Banks, she talks to hear her own voice, I think you type to read your own posts.

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